Visit Paul and Nickolena Reuter’s Vantage House apartment, and you’ll see a framed American Freedom Train Flag on one wall. Beside it is a plaque Paul received from the American Defenders of Bataan and Corregidor for his continued service to the fraternal organization.

Paul Reuter, now 82 and a World War II veteran, remembers the Death March of Bataan like it was yesterday. Taken prisoner, the evacuating American and Philippine soldiers were used as human shields. Japanese artillery, aimed at American outposts further away, fired over their heads, showering the prisoners with burning fragments. 

“Loud, those guns were so damn loud,” Reuter says .    

Closing his eyes, Reuter recalls his 42 months of captivity. On one work detail, he helped to bury 200 of his comrades in just four days. On another, he was one 300 men who helped build a road. Just 187 returned. 

“No one knows what happened to the others,” Reuter says.

Stones littered the spoiled rice the prisoners were given to eat.  Malnutrition combined with malaria, dengue fever, tuberculosis, scurvy and other diseases were common.  Reuter lost half of his body weight.

But he considers himself lucky.  In 1943 he and 400 other prisoners were transferred to Japan. He went to work in a steel mill 35 miles southwest of Osaka, and that’s where he stayed until the war ended two years later.

His first stop on U.S. soil was the Valley Forge General Hospital where he spent eight months recovering.  And it was there, during a leave, that he met Nickolena over a spaghetti dinner. They are the parents of five children, all of whom live in the Maryland/Virginia area.

Today, Reuter is a staunch advocate of veterans’ rights. And he and Nickolena are at a time in their lives when they want peace of mind. That’s why they chose Vantage House. With everything they might need, including assisted living and nursing home care, under one roof, their lives are worry-free. Paul Reuter’s come a long way from Bataan.